Cochise Stronghold T-Dub'ing and a No-Go at Bisbee

I am presently camping on the west side of the Dragoon mountains.  This mountain range is also known as the Cochise Stronghold.

It served as a stronghold for the Apache Indians as a waged war with the United States Army back in the days of Western expansion.  As you can see in the following photos, it was quite the stronghold and I'm guessing pretty inaccessible to US Cavalry troops.  I don't know if any US Infantry was ever deployed but I've my doubts as tactics of the time didn't cover fighting in such rugged terrain.

Thursday, March 14

I went over to Council Rocks, site of some petroglyphs: LINK, but this time just concentrated on landscape pics.

The interesting tall stalks are Soaptree Yucca Plants

The old and the new way to power the well's pump

Sheepshead Peak

Friday, March 15

Dreary day, mostly overcast and high temperature barely 60 degrees!  Stayed inside the VRRV mostly, doing cleaning and reorganizing while listening to audio books and podcasts.

Saturday, March 16

The idea had been to drive the Honda CR-V the 30 miles or so to Bisbee, AZ and check out its offerings.  Things looked pretty crowded as I entered the historic district portion of Bisbee.  Bikers everywhere!  The place was teeming with biker wannabes, it looked to me like a small version of Sturgis.

I left without touring Bisbee.  Some other time.  

And no, I am NOT a biker...back at the beginning I might have gone with being seen as a Rider but those days are gone too.  

Instead, once I returned to the Tombstone area, I checked out a BLM Hunting Preserve SW of the town.  Not bad, saw some spots I could camp at and the best part of course was there was no one there!

Some barely snow-clad mountain peaks were visible in the distance but otherwise, not much in the way of scenery at this location.

I'm not sure when I'll displace from here, either tomorrow or Monday.  I'm waiting to see what the weather will be like.  Pretty good today when the sun is shining but a bit cool when clouds obscure it.

Boondocking by the Dragoon Mountains

Yesterday, March 13, I left the Indian Bread Rocks BLM Rec Area and headed to Willcox, AZ to dump tanks and take on water and propane.  The KOA there, which I've used before, has gotten more expensive.  $15 to dump and $15 for water!

I then fueled up at the Love's and got propane there.

Next I drove to Benson, AZ where I'd hoped to pick up an Amazon delivery at the locker there.  The package hadn't been delivered yet so I elected to go stay for a few days at the camping areas in the Coronado National Forest near Tombstone, AZ.

The original plan had been to get the package then continue the 90 minutes or so to the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge.  Oh well, no rush right?

The place was about 1/3 full when I got there and I grabbed a spot that I'd used before on a previous trip.

Later in the afternoon, under mostly cloudy skies, I rode about on Yagi to look around.

The sunset was pretty good:

Visiting the Chiricahua Regional Museum in Willcox, AZ

 Yesterday, March 12, I drove the CR-V to visit the nearby town of Willcox, AZ and the Chiricahua Regional Museum.  Pretty well curated museum, with some interesting new info for me.  

On a previous camping trip, I'd checked out the Chiricahua National Monument: LINK.

As usual, here's some of the stuff that caught my eye.  Plenty of other things at this museum of course.  From vintage tools and instruments, displays of drugstore items from back in the day, information, items and photos of Fort Bowie, and the piece de resistance: information and photo of famed Apache Chief: Geronimo.

Having just toured Apache Pass the day before, this illustration helped me visualize how things might have occurred, back in the day:

Some information on the town of Willcox and how it got its name.

Inset pic from above poster that I

found interesting.

The town's namesake.

A historical photo and a NPS depiction of Fort Bowie, which was established to support US Army operations against the Chiricahua Apache.

Geronimo

While on active duty with the US Army, I spent a collective year of my life going through schools at Fort Sill, OK.  The home of the Field Artillery.  

I didn't know this was part of the history of Fort Sill.  

Geronimo's name lived on as part of the history of the US Army's Airborne Infantry Regiments of WWII.  There was a poster with the history of the use of the name "Geronimo" by early paratroopers, to demonstrate they weren't scared while doing their parachute jumps.

They'd picked up the name after having watched an old movie featuring Geronimo you see, right before their first jump, and one of them declared he'd yell the name to show he wasn't afraid.

The yell was echoed by other paratroopers and even ended up on unit insignia:

I found it slightly ironic that Geronimo's name was taken up as a battle cry by US Army troops later on.  I guess they didn't go into the "history" of the name.  Or, perhaps, they were honoring a recognized warrior?

After the museum, I wandered about on foot nearby and spotted this other museum:

Rex Allen, the last of the Silver Screen Cowboys

I didn't go into the museum, sorry.

On a completely unrelated note, I spotted the rig from Deutschland:

Back at camp, I leisurely packed up the outside bits of the camp, listened to an audio book at the same time and checked out a rock I'd spotted before:

Here's the nearby rock pile, with the red arrow pointing to the rock in question:

Here's a closer look and you can probably surmise what caught my eye:

However, once I made my way around the rock, a better image surfaced as to what the rock looked like:

A cow's skull of course, what were you thinking?

I'll be displacing on Wednesday towards the BANWR: Buenos Aires National Wildlife Area.

Sunset turned out well:

T-Dub'ing to Apache Pass

Yesterday, March 11, I rode Yagi, my Yamaha TW200 over to nearby Apache Pass.

The pass is one of the main routes through the Dos Cabezas (Two Heads) mountain range/wilderness.

The pass is also closely connected to nearby Fort Bowie National Historic Site.  I'd visited the fort before:  LINK.  This trip I elected to check out the pass itself.

As you can see, not much of a pass with today's road conditions but I imagine back in the days of horse and wagons, it was quite the trek.

Not to mention of course, the struggle between the white settlers and the existing Apache tribes living in the area.

As I headed back towards the trailhead, I spotted a sign I'd missed on the previous trip.

Yagi is posed below near the above sign.  I could see how the area would have made a good rest stop for the wagon train but also a good spot for an attack by the Apache.

I returned to the campsite with no further explorations, to rest the day away.

This wind mill is near the entrance to

Happy Camp Canyon Rd.

Oh, in answer to a previous query from CCjon: The wind vanes spin clockwise.

A better view of the rocks...